Chaos

Random. Tension. Problem. Shortage. Running. Scampering. Agony. Pain. But still looking for balance. Hoping. Dying of hope. Still hoping. Craving for a day of solace. Not finding. Of wanting a holiday. Of never having the time. Of hoping against hope to get some stability. But every day is a chaos. Wake up. Run. Run . Run. Walk. Run. Work. Run. Plastic Smile. False laughter. Empty words. Broken Promises. Run . Run. Run.

The why. The who. The when. Why me? Why you? Why them? Why not me? Why not them? Understanding. Holding the thought and letting go. Trying to hold on again. But then everything flowing by.Giving strength. Feeling pain. Broken trust. Fairy tales lost. Again another dream. Dream. Dream. Dream.

What ? look behind. Someone there. Someone lost.But keep walking. Still looking behind.  Slam on to the wall. Oh. Look forward. What? Fog. No, it's misty eyes. No, a blank wall. Bang again. Turn. Run. Turn . Run. Back again. Circle. Pattern. Lost. No found. Lost. Lost . Lost.

Chaos. Chaos. Craziness. Of living like the dead. So many directions. Directionless. Of so many words. Of seeking silence. Seeking peace. Movement. Tiring movement. Sloth in movement. The journey stopped. No progress. No growth. Change. Change. Change.

Curve. Delving Down. Learning at zero. Worker. Non- worker. Bitching men. Manly women. Painful politics. tempers on short fuse. Egos in bull fights. Bull. Same old story. Painfully long. Stop. stop. stop.

Chaos.

Theory.

It's so funny, you don't laugh...

Seriously.

Being religiously away from news channels and newspapers, takes me time to catch up on the great (non)issues of the world.

After the comedy circus of the baba doing a drag , it's the times of india starting a campaign against raising of the legal drinking age to twenty five.The first thing you think is who's sponsored the half page advertisement and the campaign? The second thought is of the billions of mumbaikers reeling under unprecedented rains, water clogged. Mumbai with its issues of housing, roads, drainage, sanitation, lack of infrastructure, increasing cases of violence and this is what is most important to the paper with highest circulation in english in mumbai.

Also on is the debate on the dance of mrs swaraj. Read somewhere an article likening it to the tandava. Well Shiva must be doing it now having read it. The reason for the party's protest is obviously lost and least important. Not the least funny is that the party is trying so desperately to find an issue to just be visible on national imagination and national television . Not to say trying to hide from public memory the yeduryappas and modis. Even worse , the lack of a strong alternative to the current government and lack of national leaders in a country of millions that's projected to surpass china's population in another decade is not so funny anymore.

There is a spate of hunger strikes on after the "success" of anna hazare's much televised, sponsored and advertised fast. They all are funny not because of the issues they take up but because you have to use "fasting", read blackmail, to make yourself heard by the government who should be doing it anyway.

Also funny are the arguments put forward by the in-power politicos, of not bowing down and not being cowered. Aah-ha. Does that mean, we aren't getting back the black money? yellow, green, red..whatever..but didn't we know that already?

The West Indies tour promises to bring up some funnier debates about money, endorsements, priorities, patriotism. I hope they get Mr Kalmadi, live from Tihar to do it.

Ms Mamata seems to have given back the disputed 400 acre singur land but the invitation to tata has also been sent.Isn't it funny? Only wandering in the tatas did set up the plant in the 600 acre would the peripheral acres be good enough for agriculture? But that's another funny debate.

That also reminds me of a certain mr ramesh for whom i had oodles of respect before he went cuckoo..or should i say, the parrot who can talk the propaganda. In Odisha, the clean government is doing its best to clean up the entire state's resources along with its forests. 

The really adarsh scam of all time may yet be the adarsh scam, but we are waiting still for the punchline. 

Funny, very funny.

But why isn't anyone laughing?

The Barefoot Dreamer

Sometimes..just sometimes my heart screams out...we bloody humans...

Human, humane, humanity.

Oxymoron, isn't it ? I sometimes fail to understand human beings. Even the wild animals live by better rules and ethics that humans. 

Every writer has once in his life said, these are strange times. I think times were never strange. It's just the humans who became stranger and stranger, a stranger to themselves and humanity. 

When people die, you rarely cry for them but more so for yourself, thinking of the pain, of the vacuum it will leave in your life. When i heard of M F Hussain's demise, i cried. I do not yet know what i was crying for. Was it the lost hope? Was it the utter senselessness of his dying in a foreign land? Or of losing a genius who always lived by his own rules?No, i do not know.

Even in his death , he is spectacular. He proved like many great people before him, that he did not live in any boundaries, so could the borders of any country keep him tied down? Even in death he unified. It's funny how the government rises to an occasion offering to bury him in india. Dear Government, you didn't deserve him. We didn't deserve a man of his greatness. Some say, he should have stayed on here and fought his critics, about his freedom of expression. Why should he have? Why? In this country where everything runs on blackmail and black money, why should he have cared? After decades of painting india internationally, he did not need to do it . Yes, we did not deserve him.

I think of his life, his journey and his end. All i feel is awe and reverence. In his death he has taught a lesson , at least to me. In life, you live only once. Live by your own rules. Sometimes, by not caring about boundaries you can create your own horizons. In life, people will always judge. In death, the judgements don't count.

The barefoot maverick , his signature long brush in hand, painted his own skies . I am sure, he is still walking barefoot on the clouds  and painting his own skies. 

[Freedom of Speech and Expression is one of the basic and fundamental right of citizens in almost every country in the world. But this hasn't stopped the fundamentalists in those countries to flourish and wield a power over governments and its people that has forced many artists, mostly writers, to live in exile. 

Tasleema Nasreen, Orhan Pamuk, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, from Bangladesh, to Turkey, to Cuba, from Germany, to Iraq , Tibet, Mongolia, China, Russia to Nigeria, people have lived away from there beloved land. A Reporter shot on the middle of the road, a painter burnt at stake, from Galileo to Da Vinci, they all have faced this at some point of their lives. From being charged with sedition to being labeled as extremists and enemies of the state , they have chosen to live in exile. These people live a life hidden from public memory, surfacing now and then, being criticised, and then remembered in death.]

A song to myself...

kahin dayra bana hai,  kahin aakhri sira hai
mahi bol bol haari, koi hai jo sun raha hai
ye koi jaane na,  ke dil maane na
bikhar jaaye na

 kaisa hai junoon ,kahin mile na sukoon
dekho kahin bhi qaraar aaye na
deewana hai kaun,  yahaan begaana hai kaun
dekho zindagi bekaar jaye na

koi bheed main khada hai, koi khud main chal raha hai
mahi bol bol haari,  yahaan jo hai besila hai
yeh saaton aasman, hum inke darmiyaan
bichad jaaye na

kaisa hai junoon ,kahin mile na sukoon
dekho kahin bhi qaraar aaye na
deewana hai kaun,  yahaan begaana hai kaun
dekho zindagi bekaar jaye na

chalti chalti jaaye ik aandhi, jo aandhi bhi nahin
manzil se kalai kuch baandhi,aur baandhi bhi nahin
jahaan raaste ne joda , wahin faasley ne toda
mahi bol bol haari yahaan sab ne haath choda
yeh koi jaane na ke dil maane na
bikhar jaaye na

kaisa hai junoon ,kahin mile na sukoon
dekho kahin bhi qaraar aaye na
deewana hai kaun,  yahaan begaana hai kaun
dekho zindagi bekaar jaye na

31

If i had to find a theme for my year gone by, i'd call it the "year of trials and tribulations" .

I can't say it was good or bad, but one thing that stands out is the fights i have had.The fights with the world, with the family, with friends and with myself.

The fights of ideology, of long drawn debates, of the rights and wrongs.

The turbulence of shifting my home ground and creating a new home and hearth. The year of living away from my parents and developing small fears that haven't let me sleep nights. Of waking up thinking about my parents , my brothers and my beautiful small sister and not knowing what to do. Of staring at blank walls and seeing my life on it running on flashback.

The checks and balances of building a new relationship. The grinding of two opposites, the friction and attraction.

The cutting of my umbilical chord with my first place of work, my people , my karmbhoomi. And the wild fern trying to find a base in the manicured lawns of mumbai. Of breaking loose from a short stint at an NGO that was exactly opposite of what i knew and believed and then trying to fit in in another place. With unlearning my lessons and relearning. With changing my perspectives and getting a new perspective. Of trying to throw it all away and finding something even in throwing away.Of finding another karmbhoomi that i feel i can make a difference in and finding people who fight with me, argue with me, and still hold me when i falter taking my baby steps.

Of losing those friends and promising never to make friends again but falling into the trap of open smiles, dimples and soul-warming hugs..Of realising, it's never too sure with people and yet never too late to start trusting.

Of  losing a first life we created, even without realising we had created. Of not knowing how to react. Of hoping and losing hope.

The year of lonely nights, of tears shed. The year of confusion. The year of love. The year laughter of a new kind. The year of realising that you can win fights and arguments but still end up losing something much more important. The year of realising that it's sometimes better to be silent. The year of understanding that you are precious but not more than a lot more things. A year of realising that my life is based on little things, the small dreams. Of realising i do not want to win arguments anymore.

The year of realising that i've lived a life of the old woman long enough. It's probably time to live again.

i am

i am vini. and i too have a story. and how i wish i could do it as beautifully as the movie "i am".

It's one of those movies that come and go at the box office but that stay with you for a lifetime because of the way the tell the stories you already knew.

A beautiful movie by onir, suri and humsafar trust talking very simply about issues within issues in four separate stories woven into the movie.

It's also a movie where the story is told not so much with dialogues but in pictures, expressions and amazing background score. The music haunts you and you are forced to pay attention to the lyrics which now a days is a feat in itself. The song "issi baat pe" by KK is a beautiful rendition and i love the sitar strings in the song..Bangur jaisi duniya (amazingly haunting music, texture of voice and lyrics), bojhal se, saaye aankhein, the other songs in the movie also stand on their own and are worth listening on those solitary walks or the long drives.

I was amazed by the number of co-producers. I realised a lot of people have believed in the story and the people who have made it and so have made sure that this movie got made. 

It now has made it to my favourite movie list for the amazing sensitivity with which the film has been made. Without being loud and crass it deals with very contemporary and real problems. A marriage where infidelity of a partner changes the life of the other person. Where the woman is stigmatised and still has the needs of her soul and body and has to deal alone with her dreams, her pain of her trust being broken and her belief in herself.A kashmiri pandit who has so much of repressed anger. What rankles you in that story are the sounds, the pictures and the beautiful dal lake. You could actually hear the collective disbelief  when dal lake floated by in the background like a swamp, no songs of happiness, no colours of flower laden shikaras, no apple coloued cheeks and no kashmiri beauties. Just dull plain "dal". It also shook me on how we have become blind to the issues that our beautiful kashmir still faces, the lives of the people who live and who lived there, of constant pain and retribution not complete.The story of an abused child where anuraag relives his own demons and you want to reach out to the child-man suri, who is struggling with the pain of his childhood, his love for his mother and his sexuality. And the story of the homosexuals, how they were and still are seen as persons to be ridiculed and taken advantage of.

And in these are interwoven the diversity of our country with at least 6 languages spoken, not counting the language of silence: Kashmiri, Bengali, Hindi, English, Marathi and Kannadda.Interwoven is the normalcy within chaos, the emotions that are never put into words and some funny lines.

Thank you all of you who have made this movie. I wish more such films are made.

The Olive Ridley Riddle

For some strange reason i have lost all that i wrote on this a while back . i had thought i'd come back and finish it off and it's sadly not been saved. But that's a different riddle. I don't think i'll be able to do justice to this post by rewriting but i do have to write about it as it's been haunting me for sometime.

The riddle is about the olive ridleys? Who are they and why conserve them? Why not any other animal?Specially when you've seen pictures of the thousands of baby turtles swarming the beaches of the Odisha Coast. They can't be in that grave a danger. At least not like the tigers. Right? 

Wrong. Let's look at this small statistic. 

According to Carr (1972), more than 1 million olive ridleys were commercially harvested off the coasts of Mexico in 1968 alone. Cliffton et al. (1982) had estimated the population of Pacific Mexico to be at least 10 million prior to the era of mass exploitation . More recently, Spotilia (2004) estimated that the global population of annual nesting females has been reduced to approximately 2 million, and Abreu-Gabrois and Plotkin (2008) estimated that number to have been further reduced to 852 550. This indicated a dramatic decrease of 28-32% in the global population within only one generation (i.e. 20 years) .(http://www.environment.gov.au/sprat)

And another one:

Olive ridleys traditionally have specific nesting grounds. Pacific olive ridley’s nest around Costa Rica, Mexico, Nicaragua, and the Northern Indian Ocean; the breeding colony in Mexico was listed as endangered in the U.S. on July 28, 1978. Though not a rule but the turtles have normally refrained from nesting in new grounds and travel thousands of kilometers in their lifetime to the specific grounds to breed.

The missing piece: In India, they nest in Gahiramatha, near Paradeep coast is Odisha. It's been a very widely filmed and media covered phenomena. Every year, you'd not  likely have missed a few conservationists  and environmentalists talking about them. And you would have always thought, at least some one's doing something. Well, not quite. 

The Odisha Government has sanctioned a port every 32 kilometers in its 480 km coastline. Added to Paradeep port, which remains largely underutilised and two more ports almost  ready to start at Dhamra and Gopalpur, the Government has sanctioned 12 more. This not only has an adverse effect on the local ecology but you firstly start questioning the reason for this. This defies all logic . What does a state do with 15 mini and mega ports?Why do we need to open up our ports and our already fragile coastal ecosystems to private companies? Who will it profit? Not the nation surely? For the record, Coastal ports are exempted from  a lot of clearances that would've been otherwise required under SEZ/ CRZ  and its later amendments in the name of "national interest". I'm sure we all know who the "interest" lies with.

Why in our country we have lost the value of our ecosystems and are hell bent on destroying the equilibrium. It's also not about the Olive Ridleys. Yes, you may not see them anymore after 40 more years except in your books and discovery channel in extinct species. The graver question is that of the policies and what dictates them. Today, the opposition in odisha is screaming on why so many companies are being given permission. But their questions are specifically related to the rampant corruption and not getting their share of meat. Or so it seems.

The Olive Ridleys were already in grave danger and ecologists were having a hard time fighting the fishing nets, the trawlers  and illegal poachers which were causing mass destruction of the turtles and their nesting sites. , they now have to fight with hundreds of big ships that will operate from those ports, not to count the massive construction that would be carried out on the coasts and many other ancillary businesses that are bound to mushroom in and around the coastline. If millions of the ridleys can dwindle down to thousands in just one life cycle, imagine what grave danger we are putting them in. It is also about understanding that we are encroaching dangerous waters literally. Japan earthquake, The Tsunamis and the Katrinas, The devastationg storms and fires, the submerging coastlines all over the world are saying something to all of us. 

How prepared are we to handle the coastal livelihoods, the marine and aquatic life forms, the endangered species and more importantly the shaking equilibrium? The Olive Ridleys are giving us the warning bell. They have rung long enough. Time we paid heed.

One really had hopes from Mr Jayaram Ramesh but seeing the course Vedanta Mining Leases and their entire operation is taking putting an entire habitat of Dongriya Kondhs and the beautiful biodiversity of  the Niyamgiri hills in jeopardy, you can't help but be afraid. So many pages written , so much of coverage on why they cannot start operations in the Niyamgiri hills, but when government plays the advocate of the mining giants, there isn't much hope left.

Life today hold no value, especially if it's a tribal life who had lived his life as a owner of lands but is now living on the margins. Let alone the Olive Ridleys and the snakes and ants, the lives of people have become pawns to be sold off for money and power. You wonder at the functionality of those laws and rules that protect the environment, the Primitive Tribes and the so called revolutionary Act such as the Forest Right Act. .

You wonder at the direction we are going, because you never know, tomorrow, it might be your life at stake for some power hungry corporate,  just on a different pretext.

(Photo-Ashok Panda: Mass hatching of Olive Ridley turtle eggs at Rushikulya River a major nesting site in Orissa. : Coutesy: www.orissadiary.com) 

(Found an interesting read:  http://infochangeindia.org/201104158758/Environment/Features/Vedanta-and-Posco-A-tale-of-two-projects.html)

Irritation

Now a days i get irritated very soon and as is wont, have been wondering what it means..

As usual, i start by writing what irritates me and then i'll come back to read it in a few days time to understand what it means..pick up Freud, or ask one of my friends who's an expert on these..

Lies. The first irritant. I can't stand it when people lie to me. This normally brings up the question, do i not lie? Yes , i do. I'm no Gandhi ji but i've had my experiment with lies. I have lied and haven't been able to carry it. It has weighed on me like a thousand stones and somehow, discreetly or indiscreetly , i've ended up confessing. And somehow, lies put me off like nothing else. I feel let down, humiliated and mistrusted.After that point i feel like getting back to that person with a lie overload, but i never can.

Holier-than-thou attitude: Yeah. You are holy. Much holier than me. Thank you. I don't follow your religion. Thank You again.

Manipulation: Someone had once told me human beings by nature are manipulative. There's passive manipulative, aggressive manipulative, coercive manipulative, hurt party manipulative, the list goes on. Of all manipulations,  the blatant, in your face, showing you my power and gloating over it manipulation takes the cake. The thing is you can't show them your middle finger even when that's all you want to do.

Taking advantage of the weak: Self explanatory. High irritant. 

Blissfully ignorant: there is ignorant and there is ignorant. When people wear their ignorance on their sleeves like a medal and take absolutely no initiative towards changing that status, well, it does get on your nerves. They can argue and argue for hours, sighting their ignorance every other minute but the expression of tone and face belying every sentence. They take pride in their ignorance . I'd at least go back, research, study, understand and then come back and argue. Yes, even if my point was right.

I don't know the exact english term for those people. in odia, we call them "galua". They hit back at you with the strangest logic. If you tell them, you don't like something, they come back say, on such and such date and situation "you" did the same. Or maybe, "what the heck if i did it, only people make mistakes, or i'm no god", and turn around to repeat the mistake.Yeah you know those people. Somehow i always want to stay away from those kinds but sadly they always catch up. Always do.

Being woken up after i sleep.Eating alone.: Both not in this context, but highly irritating nonetheless.

Bad body odour, stinking mouths and uncleanliness: For obvious reasons. The worst kind is when people do it and feel it is bohemian and fashionable to be dirty. I've heard this from a few, that tigers don't brush their teeth and lions don't have a bath everyday. But neither do pigs and and the horrible smelling he-goats,( no offense to the animals, that's their way of life, just not mine. love them , so as not to hurt them, but can't surely stay with them.) but who wants to prove a point. I'm disgusted and that's it.

People who do not stand by their words: The worst kind. Never believe them, but if it's a person who's currently an indispensable part of your life, well, you've had it. They are manipulative, self destructive and take advantage of you because they know your weaknesses.And if it's your work space, woohoo, BINGO!

Being a part of an injustice. All those things i stood against. All those things i put up a fight for. And now, i become a silent spectator. A mute audience. With bile burning my insides, turning my food upside down. Sadistic. Masochistic.

I am angry is obvious. But what is the solution. I know i need "something". I know it's the dissatisfaction. But then i question myself. Why? I wasn't so dissatisfied in not so distant past. And i question, if this is the life i want.

Interpretation: There is a lot of clutter inside that needs cleaning up. I need control over people, things and situation which most times shall not be so. I am currently in company of people who are breaking my beliefs and preferences and it's shaking my established rules, which is resulting in the chaos.

Yes, i do understand all this. But i still question. Is this the life i bargained for?

Dams Broken...

You have fallen,
so many times

most times unseen
in the darkness of the night,
behind closed doors
in anger, in frustration, in hurt and pain.

And then you've fallen, uninhibited
in pride, in victory, in achievement

you've fallen in the rain
in the shower, down the drain

you've fallen from a window of a bus
and of a passing train

you've fallen on the feet of your oppressor
on a daughter's wedding day

you've fallen in the long lonely nights
into the pillows in silent convulsions
you've fallen when all doors have been shut on you
on your invisible god's lap

you've fallen in your mother's embrace,
in your father's arms.
you've fallen at the birth of your baby
at the deathbed of someone close

sometimes you've checked yourself
within the dams of the eyes
and sometimes you've flooded
breaking all barriers

flooding your dreams
your relationships
your hopes

sometimes you've been brushed away
in a charade of smiles
you've been wiped away
at someone's approach.

but how you've fallen
quenching a thirst
and starting another one.

You have fallen
sometimes without reason
and sometimes
the reason has not been enough.

The witch...

I call her the witch, the sorceress,who entices you, incites you, allures you and then completely engulfs you.And you in the whole while have not realised that you've been bewitched.Yes, you've hated her when you came here if you came from outside..yes, you've called her names, you've been suffocated but you've slowly but steadily become a part of her..the witch..mumbai..the witch..

People normally lead two lives. One their personal, the other their life at work or a school or college if you still haven't started work. But if you live in mumbai, you lead a third life. The mysterious affair with mumbai. A life that's only your own, with its own secrets, fantasies, dreams, complications and those amazing moments like every affair..pre-marital or extra-marital...it's as guilty, as pleasurable, as angry, as the secret rendezvous with your beloved.

This city has been my city for a year almost now and i still haven't put up a blog on her. (even when people have been wondering out loud, that i've lost it..). The truth is, it's because it's mumbai. It's because paeans, odes, essays can be written about the city and still not be done with it. Because there are places you visit  in your life and when you write about it,  it barely makes it to a page...but mumbai? I could write an epic on just on one of it's aspects..thicker than an Ulysses..i could just create another blog that would have daily updates about the dichotomy of mumbai, or i could write an hourly journal on the people i meet and places i go..it's mumbai.

What could i write about ?

The local trains? That keep you on your toes literally. Where your time runs parallel to the mumbai locals. The daily fights and shouts in the compartments, the running over your feet, mausi whose legs are swollen with pus oozing out and still carrying a load a few times her body weight and girth..the designer wear clad fashionistas who cringe when someone passes them by, the kohl eyed eager college kids, the burkha clad women who tear off their naqaab in the safety of the women's compartment, the men who are courteous if you've accidentally gone into a the men's compartment(not really theirs technically but you know what i mean)   The locals where relationships are forged for lifetimes, having travelled are the same time, in the same compartments for years.

Mumbai, a country of it's own..it's neither india..it's neither maharashtra and nor can any community from any place in the world claim it has not a counterpart in mumbai. Mumbai is its own world.

Mumbai where nothing is still, nothing is static. It's always in motion. Mumbai is fluid. It runs, in trains, on roads, in cars, in buses, in rains and in your veins. 

Nothing divides in mumbai and then you lose count of the divisions.Whose mumbai? The Thackrey's mumbai, the migrant mumbai, the ex-pat mumbai. The night life mumbai, the morning of mumbai. When one life in mumbai goes to sleep, the other gets into action, scrambling to plays, to theatres, to cinemas, to pubs, to discs. And as they loiter back home inebriated in the wee hours, the other half rises, getting ready for another day in mumbai. Mumbai.

In mumbai every body who is somebody somewhere is a nobody and every nobody is the mumbaikar, it's soul. Where a bhaiya drives mumbai to its destination and a maharashtrian taxi driver may just dump you if you called him a bhaiya. The bais with their super fast time management skills could give many corporate honchos and our politicians a lesson or two. Mumbai where every community has a clan, where every clan moves with a pride and sense of identity.

The children who run away from home anywhere in india reach one destination. Mumbai. They sell books, combs, knick knacks and then they sell themselves. Looking up at models and role models in juhu, in taj, at nariman..they sport their style, the hairstyle, selling themselves bit by bit but the dream in their eyes alive. As alive as the fluttering clothes at dhobi ghat.

Mumbai , where houses are more precious than your life. If you have one, you're god. If you haven't, you dream of becoming one. Mumbai lives facing the sea and the creek..The west sea faces the rich and the famous, the west, the slum dwellers of colaba, BPT and Mankhurd, Mumbai. One side pays a million to get a sea view, the other half choses to stay away from the sea, the stink, the junk floating, the debris, the defecation grounds. Mumbai.

Mumbai where you spot a someone somewhere every other day, a filmstar, an activist and then they vanish into the cloak of anonymity. Where the children grow up in the schools of BMC where you fight for a  four hour slot, fighting for a place even to sit  or in a school like American School of Mumbai where you've an indoor airconditioned stadium , a cafeteria that sells coke at double it's costs.

Mumbai where a woman can chose to live alone. Mumbai, where she can break all rules. Live the dream of other women . Where a woman can travel alone any time of the day . Or Night. Mumbai, where a woman is safe and so walks with the confidence and poise of a tigress.

Mumbai where every story on celluloid in someone's reality.Where every reality is so unreal.  Mumbai where every dream is within your reach. In a mall,  just steps away.

Mumbai, where everyone is filled with so much of passion and mission. Mumbai where every eye has a dream, where every dream is shared. And in mumbai, i too dream, of being back, in my native land.

Mumbai where you suddenly look at the sky from the train at night and see a twinkle in the sky, you wait for it to move because you think it's an airplane hovering but laugh  at yourself  when you realise it's a star. You laugh because you'd given up hope of seeing a star in its polluted sky and you laugh at yourself for giving up hope in mumbai. In mumbai, it's life . And life is hope.

Dwand

i'm at a strange phase of my life..

i've been here before..and so i'm scared for myself..and for everyone around me..it's my phase in life where i've let my mind rule my heart..where every moment i am thinking and questioning..about the why's and why nots..about alternatives..about roads and crossroads..

i know i'll be reckless now, because i'm not afraid anymore..at least not regarding certain things like losing because i know there are a certain things in life that i'll certainly lose..and if i've to find, i'll find again..

i question a lot of things in me..specially where i've let people take adavantage of me..because i've been quiet when people have taken from me what wasn't rightfully theirs and i've taken from them a behaviour which i did not deserve..today, i still do not want to challenge other people when they do that but i question myself today why i do it? What is it that i let them..i let them wield a power to hurt, to pain..do they own me? not really, but i have let hem..do they own the pain and hurt they give me? No- because they don't even realise that.

i've made them too powerful..and that's my nemesis.

i question what is right. My inherent affinity to keep quiet when it comes to people i love..hoping that if i love them enough and if they love back, they'd understand without explaining. But i now understand love means different things for different people. You either understand that love or you move on..

I feel hurt and confused. But the time says i've to move on. 

There is a time when you have to realise that you are not the demon people say you are. It is not a sin to expect a hug, a smile, a patient ear, a look, a touch..It's not insane to ask  for a favour..And you have the right to receive too, a right to be cared for, to be loved..like you have..and for a change, perhaps, even when you haven't..Is it too much to ask?

( for all of us who're going through this with a loved one. You know it's for you. )

Speedbreakers...

Life has a strange way of surprising you..teaching you..and telling you..that all that you had all figured out and laid out on a platter..well, that wasn't all.life turns your life topsy turvy just when you thought you had found your rhythm, found your peace.Just when i was writing about patterns in life and fighting and arguing that i see patterns in almost everything, life surprised me again.

i lost my wallet day before yesterday during my travel..the daily mumbai local routine from lower parel to navi mumbai.traversing daily from western to central to harbour line.changing trains at the most crowded and dangerous platforms.it carried all my important documents: my passport, my identity cards from office,my debit and atm cards, my membership cards,some cash and my sodexo vouchers.

It has happened to me a lot of times..a pattern probably..but again , maybe just my ridiculous search for a sequence, a pattern. i digress. As i was saying, most times when something has gone wrong i get a premonition. I am a great believer of karma. I believe that if i do something that i feel is not right, it comes back to me, in a certainly certain way. 

I feel this happened because of a few things. The first was my arguments and my stubbornness in my trying to find patterns and taking an almost insolent stand with my husband to justify that. Even when i was doing that, i was in realisation of my stupidity but i went on with it anyway. The second was my role in firing someone in my new workplace. Even though i still did not know him much and my heart i believed that the decision seemed hurried, i did it because it was an organisational requirement or so it was justified by myself. The third, i was reading a book called "River Sutra" by Gita Mehta. There's a chapter that explained a billionaire renouncing his life to become a jain monk which had me thinking how i would feel if everything that made me comfortable was taken away from me. If i too was at a crossroad where i had to fight my lone battle. Where i too was faced with challenges that were too big for me. How would i react? How would i behave? How would i feel?

When i got down from the autorickshaw infront of my building, i realised i did not even have a single rupee on me, not even to pay for the rickshaw,. i borrowed money from the watchman, went home , got the money from my piggy bank and went back to my office, all the way. And as i did, praying that i had left my wallet in my drawer i was pushed, squeezed, stepped on, caught between a crossfire, an eternal wait for a train just 3 minutes from my office due to faulty announcements when i  just couldn't run anymore, everything that could go wrong, going wrong...walking till my office, in my heart knowing i wouldn't find my wallet anymore, coming back yet again , all in the rush hour from 5.30 till 10 pm not even sitting down for a minute, all alone..

The police station visits, the calls to banks, going to sleep at 3, waking up early to do the cooking for a long planned party, running to banks to get  duplicate cards, attending a session with friends and coming back home to finish cooking before the guests arrived. In the meanwhile fighting with myself and trying not to have violent outbursts and not succeeding at all.

There was life-smiling its mischievous smile..answering my questions, questioning my insolence..there was life showing me a mirror..telling me that i still am not that strong as i imagined.that even a superwoman can feel broken and feel like giving up everything. That most strong of people have their weak moments when you want to just let go and lean on a pair of shoulders.

i also learnt, i'm still the same girl i always was. I still accept my failures and take responsibilities for things i did wrong. I am still questioning myself. I am still changing myself.

I do not know what i will do tomorrow, but today a small incident has shown me that life is a mystery and i can just let it unfold.The wallet is gone. It may just come back. I may just wake up and find that someone's put it on my doorstep. Like many times when i have learnt my lesson , all things may turn out right..or maybe not..I today see it as a speed breaker..a nuisance in the fast lane lane but necessary to save you from an accident...

Patterns..Life..Life..Patterns..

Life ..patterns..

tick-tick..tick-tick.

in the dates, the days, the years..

in numbers, in colours,in structures,in structuring.

a pattern in sarees, in clothes,in trousers,in shirts,in the tiny stitches,in the prints,the cuts..

a pattern on the speed breakers, on the sidebars by the bridge, pattern in the zebra crossing, the police cordon, the street lights,the neon lighted advertisements,the flags of political rallies,the banners of an upcoming event .

the way the lights come up as the sun goes down, the pattern in the sun itself going down, coming up back again, day after day..night after night.

the pattern in birds sitting on an electric line, the pattern in flying birds,the pattern in their feathers,the pattern in birds themselves.

the pattern in stars, the shapes in the cloud, the ripple in the waves.

the pattern in leaves, in flowers, in trees, in branches.

the pattern in art, in madhubani, in warli, in picasso, in hussain.

a pattern in the way we walk, the way we sit, the way we arrange our furniture,we fold our clothes,we keep things, a pattern in how we cook, how we wear clothes.

a pattern in how we sleep,how we wake up,a pattern in how we like to travel,how we don't, how we pack, how we unpack.

the pattern in smiles, the patterns in tears, the tear drops.

the pattern in dohas, in sonnets, in couplets, in haiku.

the pattern in prose, the pattern in poetry.

the pattern in ppt presentation,a graph,a projection on it, the sensex.

the pattern in milestones, in distances, in minutes,in weights.

the pattern in lines in a face, the pattern in the eye lashes,in the arch of the eye brows, the pattern in the lips.

the pattern in the grotesque, in the stitches of a wound, the pattern of a scar.

the pattern in sounds, the patterns that make it music, the pattern in raindrops.

The pattern of birth, of growing up, getting old, dying.

In the things we have done, in the things life has done to us.

in the decisions we have taken, in the decisions we haven't.

in the things that we have carried with us, the things we have left behind.

the patterns in things we say, the things we cannot, things we do not.

patterns in people who we remember,people we forget.

a pattern in the things we see,pattern in things that we don't.

a pattern in relationships, a pattern in their making, a pattern in their breaking.

a pattern in the life you lead, a pattern in life you chose.

a pattern in doing, a pattern in not doing, a pattern in undoing, a pattern in being, a pattern in unbeing.

tick-tick..tick-tick.

life..patterns...